Mobile computing and use of “smart phones” has improved rapidly and spread to all continents and cultures. The rapid growth is due to vastly increased usefulness of the devices. Hardware and software improvements make computational devices powerful presenters of information. They also collect a wide variety of information from the users' environment, such as GPS location, video, voice, bar code scanning, and small amounts of written text.
Text input technology for the user has lagged far behind in development. This is unfortunate because textual content is the most significant transmitter of conceptual material from the user.
Many users need to produce, log, or transmit specific textual content using a variety of non-standard characters while they are mobily computing. Emergency medical technicians, first responders, security personnel, and reporters need to transmit important, specific data and they would often benefit from being able to send it textually rather than audibly, and without having to look down at their text input interface or device.
Current keyboards require the user to reposition their fingers by lifting them off the device to find and press different keys, or by moving the fingers to a different location on the surface of the device. For instance, QWERTY keyboards require you to move each finger to a variety of different keys in order to enter different characters. The Swype keyboard mobile application requires the user to slide their finger across the surface of a virtual keyboard displayed on the screen. Other one-handed keyboards or keysets require you to press different locations by moving your finger tip to different locations. There are some key sets which allow you to rest your fingers on the same surface without moving them off that surface for the duration of a text entry session, such as the chorded keyset, but those keysets take advantage of only one finger motion: the finger press.
Prior versions of keyboards have had at least one of the following problems:
1. Required repositioning of fingers in order to key in different characters;
2. Were not portable in that they were intended to be placed on a desk or other work surface;
3. Could not be easily placed into a pocket or purse.
The keyboards that require finger repositioning can require the user to look down at their fingering on the text input device. This is the problem with the QWERTY keyboard, which is why the letters are written on each key. A lengthy training period is required before the user is able to type all characters on the keyboard without looking down at the keys. QWERTY keyboards are usually operated directly in front of the user so that if they need to they can look down at their finger positioning or to find a special key.
The present invention seeks to provide a solution to the aforementioned problems as an input device designed to provide the maximum number of finger input movements without requiring the replacement or repositioning of fingers on the device.
The invention device solves these problems by designing the device shape to detect each fundamental finger movement. The most distinguishing characteristics of the invention are:
1. The keys are designed to be triggered by natural finger movements.
2. The fingers do not need to be repositioned in the device in order to actuate any of the keys.
3. The motion of the finger pressing the key is relative only to the stable position of the invention in the users hand itself and not to any other surface or mount. This makes the invention particularly useful for mobile applications including situations where the user is walking, running, or talking part in other activities.4. The frame of reference for all the keystroke movements is relative only to the invention device itself. The user does not need to concern himself with any other frames of reference when keying text. He can focus on and isolate in his mind each of the keystroke movements, which the device can also teach him.
Finger flexion, extension, hyper-extension, abduction and adduction movements may all be detected by the shape of the present invention. The device may include a grip with affordances for each finger and thumb of the hand, such that when the user holds the invention their fingers come to rest on comfortable seats for each finger and each section of the finger. Each of the finger affordances may be movable levers which rotate or press in accordance with natural finger movements by pivoting or pressing approximately where each finger joint pivots. The lever movements are arranged in such a way as to cause the actuating of momentary switches or other sensors in the device. The first switch actuated in a chord sequence causes the beginning of a code signal in the device. Subsequent switch presses are registered as part of a character code. When all the switches are released a specific character is calculated from the sequence of switches pressed.
Terms used:                Keystroke: a single-click activation of a single switch on a single joint of a finger.        Character: the character report that is transmitted to the text input receiver.        Character chord: a collection of one or more keystrokes into a set, which produces a character report through the HID transmitter.        HID transmitter: The (human interface device) transmitter that sends characters from this invention device to a text-input receiver such as a mobile phone, computer, or any other device that can receive text input via any standardized text input signal.        Alias/shortcut: a collection of keystrokes that are not assigned to any character, but which can then be used for character sets, whole words, or text commands.        
The hand has a natural axis that is developed in earliest youth and provides for the coordination of the fingers and thumb so that they can be used to pinch. This is probably one of the first coordinate systems a child develops since they are always available to the child to study. The fingers can be wrapped to form a grip. This is a move that infants are good at, so good in fact that newborns can often lift their own weight by gripping a wooden dowel which can be lifted as a cross-bar over their heads. The grip coordination of the fingers to the palm probably starts even before we are born.
Soon, the infant is able to pinch the thumb to the forefinger. He is able to reliably and automatically orient the forefinger and the thumb do that their tips touch and press together to form a clamp with objects can be manipulated by. After that he can quickly develop the same ability with each of the other fingers. In this way his fingers become indexable.
Humans are distinguished from other primates by saying that we have opposable thumbs. Our thumbs can be pinched against our fingers. But our fingers are also indexable, meaning each finger can be flexed individually and with great dexterity. It allows such things as counting on one's fingers. The present invention takes advantage of human finger indexability by aligning the keystroke action specifically to the natural flexion and extension of each finger. The flexion of each finger joint is captured as a keystroke. The extension of the proximal joint, the joint connecting the finger to the palm, is captured as a keystroke. In this way the fingers do not have to be moved to a position before activating a keystroke. The movement is the keystroke.
There are a variety of existing text input coordinate systems. As people find text input more useful in their lives, such as in professional or personal endeavors, it becomes more important to improve the efficiency of the text input process systems. To improve the text input process, the coordinate systems have been improved and made more stable. Here is a brief review of common text input tools and improvements, and the trend that they illustrate.
Keyboard and Mouse: The keyboard and mouse combination requires use of the elbow coordinate system to move between the keyboard and mouse. Once the fingers are on the keyboard they are oriented according to the home row keys, “asdf” for the left hand and “jkl;” for the right hand. The home row keys associated with the index fingers, “f” and “j”, are usually marked with bumps so that they can be identified by the index fingers without requiring visual orientation with the eyes. In this way the fingers can be positioned into their regular orientation and coordinate system without requiring the use of a second sense organ and eye-to-hand coordination, which might impede other activities and requires extra mental processing faculties.
Once the fingers are oriented on the homerow keys they still need to be able to reach all the other keys on the keyboard. Each finger, including the index fingers, are required for access to additional keys. That means that the index fingers must regularly move from their coordinate basis position, losing touch with the keys that have bumps on them, and losing tactile confirmation of the center of their coordinate system. Then, once the alternate key has been pressed, the fingers are moved back to their basis position, which requires replacement of the index fingers. Moving fingers to alternate keys requires stretching the fingers in relation to the home row keys a certain particular distance, and at a certain angle, which must be remembered for each key, and which is different on a variety of keyboards.
Moving to the mouse and back again: Each time a user has to move his hand to the mouse he moves his right hand away from the home row keys. He then processes activities in the mouse coordinate system (x-y movement, right and left-click, and mouse-wheel) he then has to move his hand back to the keyboard by manipulating his shoulder and elbow coordinate systems. His entire hand must be moved through a distance that does not provide any input data. The movement of the hand is simply required because the right hand is used for both the keyboard and mouse input, each having their own coordinate systems, and those separate input systems must awkwardly be located at a distance from each other. Each time the user uses the mouse their hand loses context with the keyboard and must be realigned with the home row keys. It is a non-optimal arrangement and people have been searching for a solution to it ever since the mouse was created.
Because of the problems of losing the context of the coordinate system, and the variety of distances and angles that must be memorized for each type of keyboard, learning to type rapidly on a regular keyboard/mouse combination can be frustrating and often requires looking down at the keyboard.
Keyboard and Trackpad: The trackpad/touchpad provides a partial solution to moving the hand to the mouse. With the trackpad/touchpad the user can access all the functionality of the trackpad with a simple wrist movement alone. It is an improvement over the shoulder and elbow movements required for the mouse, but it still requires realigning with the home row keys. It is better than the mouse, but it is not good enough.
IBM Trackpoint: IBM made an improvement to the keyboard/mouse combination by providing a red “TrackPoint”, which is a combination finger-operated joystick/button located in the center of the keyboard. It allowed users to keep most of their fingers on the home row keys so the hands need not lose the coordinate system context of the keyboard every time they operate the mouse cursor. However it required that the user wait for the mouse cursor to move across the screen. Since the TrackPoint was at a fixed location on the keyboard, mouse motion had to be inferred by the length of time the TrackPoint was displaced in the direction of movement. With careful settings this delay could be minimized but not eliminated. The fine-tuned settings could not easily be transferred to other computers and didn't work at all with non-IBM computers. It, also, only worked on IBM laptops.
Swype Software Keyboard for Smartphones:
The Swype keyboard makes an improvement on the mobile software keyboard simply by removing the requirement that the finger be lifted off the mobile device screen between keystrokes. In this way the Swype keyboard is like the current invention in that it keeps the finger in the context of the keyboard coordinate system for the duration of a whole word. The finger can sense the direction it is being dragged in through the friction on the pad of the finger. This provides local sensory feedback straight to the hand about those movements, not requiring the use and synthesis of auditory sensations as the audible beep of a keyboard does. The user still must use vision to initially orient the finger on the keyboard, and for error-checking in longer words, so it is still not at the ergonomic level of the current invention.
Gest: Gest is still in development and they have some large usability hurdles yet to overcome, but they have identified some of the same problems. Their approach is generally high-tech, requiring imaginative uses of delicate sensors and advanced signal processing to interpret multi-joint hand gestures. Instead of identifying the unit of finger movements, they are trying to divine gesture units in general, and that is why they are seeking extensive non-trivial programming help through their software development kit, which they have published and are promoting to interested programmers.
Voice input: Many systems allow voice input of text, such as Amazon's Alexa, Apple's Ski, Microsoft's Cortana, and others, but there are at least three constant problems with this method:
1. Other people can hear all of the text commands you are issuing. There are many cases where this is not desirable either for the user, or for the surrounding people.
2. Nearby people can purposefully, or inadvertently, overwrite or intermingle their voice statements with the intended user's statements.
3. The audio environment must be low-noise in order for the words to be understood.
4. There are also security concerns with an always-on microphone listening for voice commands and in many security sensitive environments this tool is not even a possible option.
Reliable text input bypasses each of these shortcomings. One thing that people most want in text input is reliability. They want to be sure that the statements they are sending are the statements they intended to send. Because voice input and gesture input require extensive non-trivial data processing in order to decipher the text, the user has to wait to see if their text was deciphered correctly.
With a tactile keystroke text input device the user has a very short feedback loop in the hand that can validate correct keying of the message and allowing for continuous improvement of their keying expertise. Over time, such training should lead to automatization of the keying process so that it becomes a “second nature”.
Command Line Interface (CLI): The command line interface (CLI) allows a user to interface with a program by typing text commands into a “command prompt” text area, usually on a computer screen. The Windows command prompt or the Mac “terminal” are examples of this type of interface. CLIs have existed since the early days of computer programming interfaces, but they are going through a phase of renewed development and are well-understood by application developers because they are simple to implement, require low computer processing overhead, and present themselves consistently across a wide variety of computer interfaces without requiring considerations of screen size and orientation, unlike graphical user interfaces (GUI) which require extensive testing on a wide variety of screen sizes and orientations.
The current device, because of its immediate orientation to the text-input context, allows quick input to any available CLI for uses such as sending SMS messages, opening any program, initiating searches, initiating phone calls, logging events with text comments and hashtags, initiating any process that an application provides a CLI for.
The present invention has the added benefit that it provides a full keyboard character set. Many command line interfaces require special characters, such as “′”, “$”, or “[”, to perform special operations. Most alternate keyboards are difficult to enter special characters with. They require navigating to an alternate screen, or in the case of voice input, the use of special commands. On the present invention no special actions are required. Special characters are simply another collection of keystrokes to be learned like the basic keystrokes and within the same character chord context.